Bittern and more migrants at a dreary Summer Leys

The weather had taken a sudden turn and the stunning Mrach sunshine had turned to cold dreary conditions with a bitter wind chill. It did mean however that birds would be on the move.

I decided to head to Summer Leys today in the hope of catching up with the Bittern that had been showing occasionally in reeds on the scrape there. I'd tried yesterday after work but as is typical with my luck with Bitterns, it failed to show, however there was a lone Curlew pecking around in front of the Screen Hide.

Today, I spent another good chunk of time looking for the Bittern, however it was a tad breezy to see it to be honest and it was no suprise it didn't show initially. So I spent quite a bit of time taking a few photos of the various birds on show on the scrape.

After this is was time for a wander to get warm. From the Feeding Station, 2 Little Ringed Plovers were a year tick, bombing along the Gull Island shoreline. Shortly after, 5-10 Sand Martins headed East. Decided to have a look from the Screen Hide next and the Curlew from the previous night was still feeding nice and close and 2 Swallows were seen for a short while dipping over the water before heading East pretty quickly, my first March Swallow!

At this point I was cursing the fact that I hadn't brought an extra layer, was freezing my b******ks off! All the same I soldiered on and 2 Little Egrets showed, 1 landing nearby, the other flew straight through. The 2 Little Ringed Plovers then came and landed in front of the screen hide and I was able to rattle off a couple of shots before they zoomed off a few minutes later.

It was then time to have another crack at the Bittern. Again my chances weren't looking great until about half an hour had passed. I suddenly realised that it was in fact sitting high up in the reeds on the edge of a willow bush. Wasn't the best view you'll ever get but was chuffed to see it. After a couple of minutes it slid down into the reeds and I managed to track it just about as it moved from left to right. It wasn't too long though before it evaporated into the reeds. It's just about visible in the photo below...just about.

Didn't really see to much after that, although as I was packing my scope into the car, my first Blackcap of the year was in song halfway down the lane.

Spring has sprung!

Saturday (24.03.12) was a scorcher! Absolutely roasting. Was doing 3 miles for sport relief the next day so went on a 3-hour run/walk north of Syresham. The usual pinebelt at SP 630 427 held 2 Crossbill again and they both showed really well especially the male which broke into song several times. Crossbills are rapidly becoming one of my favourite birds. They're really unusual looking things and their behaviour is great to watch...illustrated by the male hanging upside down on a pine cone, only for the cone to fall off the tree leaving the crossbill to go flying!

The Golden Plover flock was still about, several with their black bellies now showing. There were around 50 birds today, constantly calling and circling around right overhead at times just West of the pine belt. Also in the area was the single resident Tree Sparrow holding territory in the NE corner of the sheepfield in the roadside hedge. A nice find were 2 Roe Deer which just ran out of a hedgerow just West of the Pine belt, the first ones I've seen in the county.

I also went a little further along the Wappenham road. There were just tonnes of Buzzards everywhere and plenty of Chiffchaffs singing in most copses. In a horsefield at SP 631 434 was a fresh looking male White Wagtail accompanied by 2 male Pied Wagtails which wasn't a massive shock given the time of year, however a nice suprise.

The next day (Sunday 25.03.12) the weather gain was stunning! After the 3 mile run, which was great fun by the way, I was very kean to get some decent photos of the Crossbills before they move on. On getting there it wasn't looking hopeful, with the farmer crop spraying right next to the pine belt. But after a while he disappeared and the 2 Crossbills (male & female) did eventually show briefly before moving to the small pine plantation slightly North of the usual one. Here, the male showed off particularly well again and as I'd hoped, I managed to get some decent shots (below). However before I could get a few more, they flew off, heading south.

After this I decided to head for Daventry and to Borough Hill for Wheatear and Daventry Country Park for recently reported Little Gull. First stop was Borough Hill. Was a few people knocking around there but mainly around the hill perimeter walk. Walking through the centre, it wasn't too long before I locked onto a pristine spring male Wheatear on the north side of the transmitting compound. It was so active and gave me the run around for a while. There wasn't too much else other than a Raven calling from behind the large copse, 1 or 2 Meadow Pipits, tonnes of Skylark and several showy Green Woodpeckers.

Daventry CP had so many people there, it was insane! There was very little bird-wise with nothing more exciting than a male Goldeneye.

Some more decent local sightings

Went for my usual walk upto the sheep field just north of Syresham between 10am and 12pm today. Turned out to be a decent morning for sightings with first of all a Tree Sparrow singing away in a tree in the north east corner of the sheep field. Was good to see 2 Crossbills were still around. They were in hedgerow trees opposite the conifer belt at SP 630 427. They both showed really well, pecking at the bark or just sitting there 'chipping' away for a good 10 minutes. Around 10 Siskins flew over low heading North around the same time. A Chiffchaff was also nearby in bushes calling loudly along with a couple of Goldcrests. The Golden Plover flock from the previous week had swelled a tad to around 100. I picked them up on call and then watched them circle round and round for a bit. As I walked back home, 3 more Siskins flew over heading east.

Later on, having returned from shopping at Tesco's in Brackley, I was greeted by a lovely Tree Sparrow in the small hedge behind out house, singing away happily right next to me. It was associating with the local House Sparrows and was a bit of an unexpected sighting to be honest!

The Big Norfolk getaway 11th - 14th March 2012

Finally a bit of time off work, wahoo! It was mine and Em's 2 year anniversary so a nice break in Norfolk was planned.

We set off Sunday morning (11.03.12) with stunning bright sunshine. Destination was the Dun Cow in Salthouse for a proper yum roast. Of course the stunning weather brought out every man and his dog and instead of taking around 2 and a half hours to get there, it was more like 3 and a quarter, with tonnes of sunseekers and fogies heading for sunny Norfolk!

The roast was, as predicted bang on. Now being full of juicy roast beef and Guinness it was time for a bit of a walk, so we parked up and headed along the east bank at Cley. The light was stunning and Arnold's Marsh in particular was well lit with its usual nice selection of waders with several Knot, Bar tailed and Black Tailed Godwit, Avocets, a few Dunlin, Ruff, Curlew and tonnes of Dark Bellied Brent Geese. On closer inspection, the Geese flock also contained 2-3 Pale Bellied Brents too which are the first I've seen in a fair old while.

There wasn't really anything terribly unusual there but it was such a lush evening I didn't really care too much to be honest! I did have a great view of a male Kestrel devouring dinner at close quarters along the shingle bank between the East Bank and North Hide. The sea was so still and it held very little birdlife other than a distant Great Crested Grebe and around 50 Wigeon.

We walked all the way down to Eye Field and the coastguards thinking there was a loo. Woops turned out to be no loo (straight into Em's badbooks!). There was a few Geese in the Eye field with 50-100 Brents with at least 1 Pale Bellied and also around 20 White Fronted Geese too.

The sunset was a real stunner and the light was great to again watch some of the the waders on offer on Arnold's Marsh with several Avocets at quite close range. As we walked back to the car, a singing Cetti's Warbler and a couple of calling Bearded Tits were noted, as well as a couple of cream crown Marsh Harriers over the vast reedbed.

After that it was off to our cracking little hotel, the Red Lion Hotel in Cromer. The next day we went to Norwich and had a hardcore shop, something I hadn't done in flippin' aaaages! Was a mint day, so nice to spend some quality time with Ems on the old anniversary!

Tuesday (13.03) from our hotel balcony I managed to rustle up a lone Fulmar heading West in the early morning sea mist. We popped over to Overstrand to see my Grandparents grave before heading to Salthouse beach car park to look for the flock of Snow Bunting that had been there in recent days. On arrival, around 20 were circling over the car park and after a while they showed really nicely either on the shingle bank or even feeding by a puddle right in the middle of the car park itself.

Also on show were a couple of distant Red Throated Divers, handfuls of both Common Scoter & Wigeon offshore and 2-3 Seal sp. showing very close in shore at times with one lingering very close to several fishermen and their rods to their disapproval! Once I'd soaked up all there was to see, it was off to Cley visitor centre for the use of the toilets! A quick scan of the reserve from the centre revealed all the expected birds plus a nice Spoonbill which was, suprise suprise asleep! It did wake up a couple of times to reveal that big bill before dozing off again!

Next we went on to Holkham to have a good stroll along the beach. Apparently there were 4 Shore Lark knocking around just east of the gap however despite an extensive search I couldn't track them down. 

We went around to the shoreline and there was a decent number of things on the sea. There were several Red Breasted Mergansers on show with a couple off males showing off their bizarre head throwing display. I soon found a nice Red Necked Grebe followed by several Common Scoter, a lone Slavonian Grebe, the rather unusual sight of a pair of Great Crested Grebe displaying on the sea and a couple Red Throated Divers. After that we headed back to the car.

Before heading off to our hotel at Titchwell I had a little look east and west of Lady Anne's Drive. There was a single Grey Partridge, a nice year tick in one of the fields just east of the drive and a walk down to Washington Hide revealed the odd Siskin and around 7 White Fronted Geese.

We then drove West to Titchwell and checked in the Titchwell Manor Hotel...well nice! Had our delish afternoon tea before heading out to the reserve at Titchwell around 4 o'clock, a short drive down the road.

The weather was pretty dam dull and miserable. On arrival, several hundred Pink Footed Geese went over northwest, presumably heading to roost. The reserve had plenty of birds, however nothing too unusual. Several Spotted Redshank were about the best I could muster. The sea provided a total of 9 Long tailed duck (4 drakes & 5 females), one Slavonian Grebe, several Red Breasted Mergansers and plenty of Goldeneye around, as there was when I was here last time with Dave.

On the way back to the car I lingered to see what would come in to roost. It wasn't long before a couple of Chinese Water Deer showed well to the west of the path, at least 3-4 Marsh Harriers showed over the reedbed and a Barn Owl was seen hunting the grazing meadow and surrounding area.

The next day (14.03) I must have been mad, but I was up at 05:40am and headed straight for the Titchwell reserve again. Was well nice to have the whole reserve to myself, barely saw a sole between 05:50am and 08:15am. Walking along the main path, several Siskins and the odd Lesser Redpoll were on show, though no sign of the Coues' Arctic Redpoll that was around. It would be nice to have seen it again, however having seen it with Dave the previous week I'd get over it if I failed to come across it.
Further down, a Barn Owl was hunting actually along the path for a minute or so before heading over towards the saltmarsh. The reserve held all of what I'd seen the previous day. The sea again held the 9 Long Tailed Duck, several Red Breasted Mergansers and plenty of Goldeneye all in the same area.




I was a little pushed for time to get back to the hotel for breakfast, though I spent a good half an hour looking around the visitor centre for the Arctic Poll. Had some great views again of around  5 or so Lesser Redpoll and a total of around 50 Siskins but sadly no sign.




So that was the end of a cracking relaxing few days in Norfolk!

A Norfolk finch fest

Yesterday was all planned for a nip into Bedfordshire for Firecrest and a a bit of a trawl round Northants with Dave James. As it turned we did a little more than that and glad we did, saw some top birds!

We set of bright an early, just after 07:00am and headed for Kings Wood, just outside Ampthill. After following the very detailed instructions were had a good scour around but sadly drew a blank despite there being several Goldcrest knocking around as well as a yound fox which wandered very close without even noticing me! Dave mentioned that the best place to catch up with Firecrest would be Lynford Arboretum in Norfolk. It was still dead early so the next minute we were wending our way to Lynford!

On getting out of the car there were numerous Siskins calls and a distant Crossbill 'chip' chip'....the signs were good! On leaving the car park we were pretty certain we had a Firecrest calling away but we thought we would leave that for later with the rather elusive Hawfinches down in the paddock the main priority for now.

The place was alive with birds with numerous Siskins and Goldcrests encountered all the way down to the paddock. As we reached the paddock there were a few closeby Siskins feeding in an alder by the bridge over the lake. On closer examination there were also male and female Crossbill and 1 Lesser Redpoll there too showing outrageously well! No sooner had these been examined, yet more Crossbills appeared in trees to our left and it soon became clear there were tonnes of them around! From not really seeing many in the last few years I've done bloody well for Crossbill in the last few weeks!! We next crossed the bridge and set up camp overlooking the paddock.

The trees in the the centre of the paddock have, in recent weeks had up to an impressive 30 Hawfinches so I was looking forward to seeing how many we could muster. A Water Rail called closeby and a nice suprise came in the form of 2 Woodlarks flying over calling nice and loudly. An unexpected addition! Just as I move to get a decent photo of one of the Crossbills Dave picked up a Hawfinch on one of the trees in the paddock, but no sooner had I turned to see it, it flew off. Typical! However we didn't have to wait too long before two Hawfinches did appear on the nearest of the trees, showing very nicely, albeit briefly. Sadly I only managed a quick record shot before they flew off too.

   

Hawfinches really are stunning, stunning looking things and it was a shame they moved on so quickly. After that we decided to walk round the circuit of the paddock and have a look for Firecrest. In an area with lots of holly and 'box hedge' foliage we were pretty certain we heard one but not 100% before a bit of rain started coming down. After sheltering for a short while, we walked back round to get one more view of some Hawfinches. We were told we'd just missed 17 of them, bugger! But it wasn't long before we found 3 in the furthest tree. These stayed for a few minutes before they too flew back towards the house.

We then went to find a Brambling that had been with Chaffinches by some feeders nearby as well as another big search for Firecrest. Sadly both these drew a blank, however we'd done pretty well see several Hawfinch, a couple of Woodlark and tonnes of Crossbill and Siskin.

So where next?! Well we were in Norfolk so it would be rude not to go up to the coast wouldn't it! So Titchwell would be the next stop via Choseley for the Corn Buntings.

A 5 minute stop at Choseley Drying Barns yielded at least 3 Corn Buntings and a few Yellowhammers in the roadside hedge.

We arrived a bit after 14:00pm with a nice bit of sun, however it was fairly breezy. One of the alders by the picnic area held around 5 Lesser Redpolls showing down to a few feet, lavly! But where was their mate, the 1st-winter Coues' Arctic Redpoll!? Well a short way along the path people quickly found it feeding considerably higher up in another alder and despite it being pretty bloody neck breaking, it showed pretty dam well. It wasn't the purist white of Arctic Redpoll you're going to see but it was still considerably paler than the other 'Polls' and was a handsome chap!

We were flippin' starving so before doing the reserve we grabbed a cheeky 'jacky p' from the cafe. It didn't sound like the reserve had too much in the way of exciting finds, however I knew that most of what I would see would be year ticks so all was good. The sea however sounded promising.

There were a decent selection of waders on show with Avocets, Oystercatchers, Redshank, Ruff, Dunlin, Grey Plover, Snipe, Curlew, Bar Tailed and Black tailed Godwits all quickly noted. On the Brackish lagoon, 3 Spotted Redshank were also showing very close to the path and looked very smart in the mid-afternoon sun.

We got to the beach and after reassurances that we should get a great variety of seaduck, we weren't disappointed! It wasn't too long before I found 4 female Long Tailed Duck not too far offshore. These were the first I'd seen for at least a couple of years. There were lots of Goldeneye out on the sea in small groups and one such group had a scoter with them. It then flapped to reveal white wing panels and it quickly became apparent it was a a 1st winter drake Velvet Scoter. Further left a nice drake Red Breasted Merganser showed, as well as 2 drake Long Tailed Duck and 2-3 Eider with more Goldeneye a little further out. This was going rather well! Further left still were another small huddle of Goldeneye. Attched to these was a nice drake Scaup, my first one at Titchwell and also the first one I'd actually seen on the sea! The shoreline held the usual suite of waders with Sanderlings bombing around, Barwits, Oystercatcher, Grey Plover, Knot and a handful of Ringed Plover.

It had got to 16:30pm and I had my Tescos shopping coming between 8pm and 10pm. So ideally we had to leave by 5. So we slowly got back to the car without seeing anything else we hadn't seen already.

Our last stop on the way home would be Wolferton Triangle, home to the infamous Golden Pheasant. Both Dave and I have made numerous diversions there on the way to Norfolk for one of these illusive little buggers without any success but it was surely worth a bash!

It was a really nice sunny evening by now and we made our way round the triangle and up round some other rhododendran bordered roads. With no sign we thought we'd give the triangle one more go. It paid off immediately with one creeping across the road a fair way ahead. So drew up alongside it and could just about make it out crawling deeper into the undergrowth. We drove down to the village before coming back up the road. Dave then spotted it's head peeking out of the Rhododendrans and we parked up a short distance away. Within a minute it gradually came out and showed incredibly well pecking around on the roadside grass verge. Dave rattled off a few shots with his camera and got a great video of the bird that can be seen here: 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTOSbtYEZMQ&feature=youtu.be

We were so lucky to get such an amazing view, a proper treat to finish off a great day's birding.